System and method for providing interactive services using a mobile device

ABSTRACT

A method of providing interactive services to a mobile device, comprising transmitting programming on-air to a first mobile device by a first facility in communication with a service provider and receiving by a second facility in communication with the service provider information based on the programming, wherein the first information comprises information relayed from the first device to the second facility after being processed by a second mobile device, is provided.

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional PatentApplication No. 61/271,117, filed Jul. 17, 2009, and entitled System andMethod for Providing Interactive Services Using a Mobile Video Device,the entire disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Mobile multimedia devices are currently constrained to either one-wayoperation, or two-way interactivity, for example on an integrated mobiletelephone device. The former devices do not have interactivity, and thelatter are closely tied to a mobile telephone service provider. In oneembodiment, the current invention enables a mobile multimedia device touse any wireless service for interactivity, and also frees the mobiledevice from needing an integrated wireless transmitter and/or receiver.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

In a first aspect, a method of providing interactive services to amobile device, comprising transmitting programming on-air to a firstmobile device by a first facility in communication with a serviceprovider and receiving by a second facility in communication with theservice provider information based on the programming, wherein the firstinformation comprises information relayed from the first device to thesecond facility after being processed by a second mobile device, isprovided.

In a second aspect, a system for providing interactive services to amobile device, comprising means for transmitting programming on-air to afirst mobile device by a first facility in communication with a serviceprovider and means for receiving by a second facility in communicationwith the service provider first information from a first mobile deviceusing a first wireless connection, and wherein the first information isinformation generated by the first device based on second informationreceived from a second mobile device connected to the first device by asecond wireless connection, is provided.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The following detailed description will be better understood when readin conjunction with the appended drawings, in which there is shown oneor more of the multiple embodiments of the present invention. It shouldbe understood, however, that the various embodiments of the presentinvention are not limited to the precise arrangements andinstrumentalities shown in the drawings.

In the Drawings:

FIG. 1 shows a basic block diagram of one overall embodiment;

FIG. 2 shows a basic block diagram of one overall embodiment comprisinga gateway manager;

FIG. 3 shows a functional diagram of one embodiment of a gatewaymanager;

FIG. 4 shows one embodiment of a wireless mobile device;

FIG. 5 shows one embodiment of a user-operated multimedia receiver;

FIG. 6 shows an embodiment of non-volatile memory for storingapplication programs and/or the program viewing history of one or moreusers;

FIG. 7 shows another embodiment of a user-operated multimedia receiver;

FIG. 8 shows an embodiment of transmitting program viewing history to aservice provider using a wireless device as a relay;

FIG. 9 shows an embodiment of transmitting an application program from aservice provider to a user-operated multimedia receiver using a wirelessdevice as a relay;

FIG. 10 shows an embodiment of transmitting an application program froma service provider to a user-operated multimedia receiver using anoff-air broadcast network;

FIG. 11 shows a flow chart of an embodiment of capturing program viewinghistory and transmitting the viewing history to a service provider; and

FIG. 12 shows an embodiment of receiving user input by a multimediareceiver and transmitting the user input to a service provider using awireless device as a relay.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Certain terminology is used herein for convenience only and is not to betaken as a limitation on the embodiments of the present invention. Inthe drawings, the same reference letters are employed for designatingthe same elements throughout the several figures.

One embodiment of the basic building blocks of the invention isillustrated in FIG. 1. The embodiment of FIG. 1 may utilize, but is notlimited to utilizing, the following technologies: digital video mobiletransmission and reception, cellular telephone data communication,short-distance wireless data communication and Bluetooth datacommunications.

Digital mobile video transmission may include over-the-air transmissionaccording to any of a variety of standardized transmission protocols,such as ATSC, ATSC Mobile, DVB-T, DVB-H, ISDB-T, 1-Seg, DMB-T, and MBMS,among others, as well as proprietary services such as Sirius satellitevideo, MediaFlo, “wireless cable” and the like. In general anytransmission system capable of supporting over-the-air real timetransmission of multimedia information may be used.

Cellular telephone data communications may include protocols from theIS-136 family, CDMA family, and GSM family, including variants of GPRS,so-called “3G” and “4G” standards, UMTS, HSDA, HSPDA, and LTE, amongothers. In general any transmission system capable of supportingwireless transmission of digital information at a sufficiently high ratemay be used.

Short-distance wireless data communication may include protocols such asIEEE 802.x, Zigbee, Ultra-wideband (UWB), and Bluetooth. Short-distancewireless data communication may also include optical methods such as anInfrared communications link. In general any transmission system capableof supporting short-range wireless transmission of information at asufficiently high rate may be used.

Bluetooth is a well known standard for short-range digitalcommunications that includes variants capable of supporting real-timetransmission of audio-visual information. For example Bluetooth headsetsfor cellular phones are widely available.

Referring again to FIG. 1, a user-operated receiver (110) providesentertainment, such as audio-visual programming and the like, to a user.The user-operated receiver uses an antenna (130) to receive programs bymeans of an over-the-air transmission (140) that is sent by a serviceprovider (150) using an over-the-air transmission facility comprising atransmitter (160) and transmitting antenna (170). This over-the-airtransmission is inherently uni-directional, so, in some embodiments,interactive return information in the form of user data (300) may beprovided to the service provider (150) as user information (310) bymeans of a wireless device (180), for example, a user-maintainedcellular telephone that may be used to relay the user data between theuser-operated receiver and the service provider.

Interactive return information may include, for example, time-sensitiveinformation such as responses to polls and/or games presented to aviewer using a display associated with receiver (110), as well as lesstime sensitive information such as requests for further informationabout a product and/or user demographic information. In generalinteractive return information may include any information supplied bythe user as user data (300).

In some embodiments, user-operated receiver (110) may use abi-directional short-range wireless connection (190) to communicate withwireless mobile device (180) by means of a short-range antenna (200). Insome embodiments, bi-directional connection (190) may comprise twouni-directional connections, i.e., one connection from receiver (110) towireless device (180) and one connection from wireless device (180) toreceiver (110).

In some embodiments, the user data (300) includes a history of theuser's audio-visual program viewing, and other user preferences. Theuser data (300) may then be relayed to the service provider by means ofa bi-directional wireless connection (210), for example the cellulartelephone network. The complete return data path communication may beautomated, so that no direct user input is required.

In some embodiments, the service provider may send data to theuser-operated receiver over wireless connection (210) and short-rangewireless connection (190). This data may include applications that mayexecute on the user-operated receiver, including user-interfaceapplications and the like.

In some embodiments, as illustrated by the preceding examples, wirelessconnection (210) and short-range wireless connection (190) need not bebi-directional, For example if there is no requirement to transmit datafrom the service provider to the receiver (110), then short-rangewireless connection (190) may be uni-directional from receiver (200) todevice (180), and uni-directional from device (180) to service provider(150). Likewise at any given instant, and even for extended periods oftime, in some embodiments there may be no need to transmit any user data(300), and in such embodiments wireless connection (210) need only beuni-directional from service provider (150) to wireless device (180),and short-range wireless connection (190) need only be uni-directionalfrom wireless device (180) to receiver (200) the vast majority of thetime.

Referring now to FIG. 2, in some embodiments, a gateway manager (320)may interface with service provider (150) and a wirelesstransmission/reception facility comprising a wirelesstransmitter/receiver (155). Wireless transmitter/receiver (155) uses anantenna (165) to receive and/or transmit information by means ofwireless connection (210). For example, in some embodiments wirelesstransmitter/receiver (155) may comprise part of a transmission/receptionfacility of a cellular telephone service provider. In general wirelesstransmitter/receiver (155) may comprise part of anytransmission/reception facility capable of communicating with wirelessdevice (180) at a data rate sufficient to support wireless connection(210) without loss of data. For example in some embodiments wirelessdevice (180) may comprise a multi-mode cell phone comprising an IEEE802.11 wireless interface, and wireless transmitter/receiver (155) maysupport IEEE 802.11 communications with wireless device (180).

Referring now to FIG. 3, in some embodiments, gateway manager (320) maycomprise one or more servers for storing, as examples, applicationprograms and/or audio-visual programming to be relayed by wirelessdevice (180) from wireless transmitter/receiver (155) to receiver (200),and/or user data relayed by wireless device (180) from receiver (200) towireless transmitter/receiver (155). Controller (322) may manage theoperations of servers (324) and interface (326). Interface (326) mayprovide data routing and/or protocol conversion functions to allow datato be exchanged among service provider (150), servers (324) and thewireless transmitter/receiver (155). Interface (326) may also compriseinterfaces to one or more other content/service providers (328) besidesservice provider (150).

In some embodiments, in order to protect the privacy of the users and toprovide a level of anonymity, the service provider may utilize theservices of gateway manager (320) that may comprise a firewall toprevent the identity of users from being relayed directly to the serviceprovider.

Referring now to FIG. 4, in some embodiments a wireless mobile device(180) may comprise a wireless transmitter/receiver (182) that maycommunicate with service provider (150) using antenna (182). Wirelessmobile device (180) may also comprise a short-range wirelesstransmitter/receiver (183) that may communicate with receiver (110).Short-range wireless transmitter/receiver (183) may, in someembodiments, comprise a Bluetooth transmitter and/or Bluetooth receiver.Wireless mobile device (180) may further comprise one or more inputdevices (187), for example, a keyboard, touch screen, one or morepointing devices, and/or a speech recognition function. Wireless device(180) may further comprise a display (189) capable of displaying videoand/or graphics, and/or an audio system (188), for example a speakerand/or headphones. Wireless device (180) may further comprise memory(186), which memory may further comprise solid-state memory and/or harddisk memory suitable for storing application programs and data. Forexample memory (186) may comprise a hard drive suitable for storinglarge amounts of audio/visual programming. Software and/or firmwareexecuted by CPU (185) may manage the various functions (181), (183),(186), (187), (188), (189) as well other functions that may comprisewireless device (180).

The user-operated receiver may typically contain a tuner (220), as shownin FIG. 5, with which to select over-the-air broadcasts, and a videodecoder (230) and video display (120) with which to reproduce theprogram content. The user-operated receiver may maintain information ina non-volatile memory (250). This information may include user-suppliedinput and/or service-provider-supplied data. User supplied input may beinput using, for example a keyboard, touch-sensitive screen, or voiceinput device (not shown in FIG. 5) associated with receiver (110) andmanaged by CPU (240). CPU (240) may process user supplied input beforestoring it in memory (250). For example, CPU (240) may runspeech-recognition software to convert digitized speech from a voiceinput device representing a user program selection to a digital datarepresentation of the program selection before storing the digital datarepresentation in a database of program selections stored in memory(250). The information about program selections may be used, in someembodiments, to provide personalized functionality to the user-operatedreceiver. CPU (240) may handle the data transactions to and from memory(250), and/or send data to wireless device (180) by means of thewireless interface (260).

The user-operated receiver (110) non-volatile memory may contain varioustypes of user specific information, as shown in FIG. 6, such as ahistory of the user's program viewing (270), as well as multiple userapplications (280). User applications (280) may be pre-stored inreceiver (110) at the factory where receiver (110) is manufactured. Userapplications may also be downloaded and stored into memory (250) usingthe wireless interface (260) and/or, as shown in FIG. 7, as auxiliarydata (126) output by a data decoder (234), that decodes data receivedusing tuner (220). For example, the signal received by tuner (220) maycomprise an MPEG transport stream containing not only audio-visual data,but also data representing user application programs. The output oftuner (220) may be demultiplexed into video data, audio data, andauxiliary data. Demultiplexed video data may be decoded by video decoder(230) and sent to display (120) Audio data may be decoded by audiodecoder (232) and sent to speaker (122) or headphones. Auxiliary data(126) which may in some embodiments comprise application programs, maybe sent to memory (250), as shown in FIG. 5, for storage as applicationsdata (280). Demultiplexed auxiliary data may be stored directly intomemory (250) by a Direct Memory Access (DMA) controller function (notshown in FIG. 5), the design of which is well known to those of normalskill in the digital design arts. Alternatively, auxiliary data may besent to CPU (240) and CPU (240) may then store the auxiliary data inmemory (250).

Program viewing history may be sent to the service provider, as shown inFIG. 8, for example, so that the service provider can aggregatestatistical information on program viewing behavior of multiple users.For example a representation of the program viewing history (270) may beretrieved from memory (250) by CPU (240) and sent to service provider(150) using wireless interface (260). Program viewing information may begathered automatically, or upon explicit request.

Program viewing history (270) may be explicitly sent to service provider(150) following a request from service provider (150) relayed toreceiver (110) by device (180). Upon receiving the request, CPU (240)may then retrieve the program viewing history (270) data from memory(250) and send it to service provider (150) using wireless interface(260).

For example, program viewing information may be automatically (withoutexplicit request from service provider (150) or user intervention) sentto service provider (150) during or after each program is viewed atreceiver (110), in which case program viewing history (270) may bestored only briefly, or not at all, in memory (250), or alternatively,after some number of programs are viewed.

Buffering of some number of program viewing indications before sendingto the service provider may be done by the receiver (110), e.g., asprogram viewing history (270) and/or by wireless device (180). Bufferingmay or may not take place at the receiver (110), according to theavailability of short-range wireless connection (190), and/or at thewireless device (180), according to the availability of wirelessconnection (210). Numerous variations of these strategies are possible.For example program viewing indication information may be sent during orimmediately after each program is viewed using short-range wirelessinterface (190), which may be assumed to have high availability, whereasdue to various transmission impairments common to wireless communicationchannels (for example, cellular “no coverage” zones) it may be necessaryto buffer one or more program viewing indications at wireless device(180) before relaying the program viewing indication information toservice provider (150) using wireless connection (210).

Referring again to FIG. 6, the user applications (280) may be specificto each user-operated receiver (110), or of a common type that can beused by a multitude of different user-operated receivers. One example ofsuch a user application (280) is a user-interface application thatprovides a method to present data to the user and to provide user inputto the user-operated receiver (110).

The program viewing history (270) and the user applications (280) canalso modify the manner in which the user-operated receiver functions.One such method of functional modification is to download new operatingsystem software, software components, APIs, etc. to the user-operatedreceiver.

Personalized functionality may be provided to receiver (110), forexample, by downloading new applications (280) into memory (250) basedupon the pre-download set of applications (280) and the program viewinghistory (270). For example the program viewing history (270) mayindicate that the user may benefit from an update to an existing userinterface application (280) which update includes better support forinteractive features of programs previously viewed and a downloadrequest may be initiated to acquire the update from service provider(150) via device (180) using wireless connections (210) and (190).

The user applications (280) may be sent to the user-operated receiver bymeans of the wireless network, using wireless connections (210) and(190) as shown in FIG. 9, or alternatively, using over the over-the-airtransmission (140), as shown in FIG. 10. A combination of the twodownload mechanisms is also possible. For example one or the other ofthe connections (210) and (140) may be unavailable at any given time,for example due to cellular “no-coverage” zones, in the case ofconnection (210), and a download partially completed using one of thetwo connections (210) and (140) may be completed by using the other ofthe connections (140) and (210). In another example, one of theconnections (210) and (140) may carry a higher monetary charge to theuser's account for downloading, and the service provider may choose thelower cost connection to minimize the charge to the user at any giventime. Many wireless devices (180), for example cell phones, includemeans for determining their geographic location, such as GPS devices.Means of determining locations of cell phones using “triangulation”based on comparing signal strengths of cell phone signals received atmultiple cell tower sites are also well known. The service provider mayinterrogate, for example, the receiver (110), and/or the wireless device(180) and/or a cellular network operator (not explicitly shown in theFigures, but a facility that may support connection (210) using wirelesstransmitter/receiver (155) and well known protocols) to determine thelocation of receiver (110) and/or wireless device (180). The serviceprovider may then choose to use the lower cost connection of either(140) or (210) for the download, based on, for example, locallyapplicable charges of the cellular network operator and broadcasttransmitter (160) operator.

The software that supports the functionality of this invention cansimilarly describe the invention, and some or all of the describedfeatures may be realized in software or hardware. One such embodiment isshown in FIG. 11. The user tunes (400) a channel, for example usingtuner (220) to watch (410) a desired program. The CPU (240) records(420) this activity, wherein such data can include the channelidentification, program name, time of program consumption, and/orsimilar information. This data may then be stored (430) in memory (250),for future retrieval. The receiver (110) may then wait (440) and repeatthis process for a predetermined length of time. After the predeterminedlength of time has expired, the CPU (240) may send (450) a history ofthe receiver program information (270) to the service provider (150).The predetermined length of time may be adjusted to provide a compromisebetween the timely relay of the information and a minimization ofwireless connection (210) network access for the return path. Ifwireless connection (210) is a cellular network connection, accesscharges may vary according to packet size, geographic location of thewireless device (180), and time of day, among other possible factors.For example, CPU 240 may wait (440) until it has accumulated enoughprogram viewing information (270) to populate an integral number of SMSmessages before sending (450) the information (270) to the serviceprovider.

Variations of the Invention

The user-operated receiver (110) including display unit (120) may, insome embodiments, also be described as a mobile TV.

The user-operated receiver (110) including display (120) mayalternatively be realized by an appropriately equipped portable computersystem, such as a laptop PC equipped with both an over-the-air TV tunerand a short-range wireless connection. The over-the-air tuner andshort-range wireless radio may be integrated into the PC, oralternatively could be provided as plug-in devices. The user-operatedreceiver and display may be realized by other appropriately equippedportable systems, such as tablet computers, “netbooks,” and other hybriddevices of arbitrary size.

The user-operated receiver (110) including display (120) may be realizedby a permanently or removably affixed system in an automobile or othervehicle.

The user-operated receiver (110) including display (120) may be realizedby other combinations of separate components, such as a set-top box withan interconnected display.

The display (120) used to render video images maybe any one of a numberof different display types, such as those constructed from alternativematerials, bendable screens, and projection devices.

The audio-visual decoder, for example video decoder (230), audio decoder(232), display (120), and speaker (122) may be replaced with other typesof processing and user entertainment devices, such as an audio-onlydecoder and sound reproduction apparatus.

The receiver (110) can process digital data that can also include otherservices that are supplied to the user, such as closed captions (124).

The wireless device (180) used to relay information may comprise, asalternatives to a cell phone, other types of wireless devices, forexample, PDA's, Blackberry's, and the like.

The various antennas described herein, for example (130) and (184), may,in some embodiments be replaced with any of various otherradio-frequency (RF) transducers, such as printed-circuit antennas.

The user may input data directly into the receiver (290), and that data(300), in turn, can be relayed to the service provider, which canmaintain and process the user information (310), as shown in FIG. 12.This data entry can be facilitated by means of an on-screen graphicaluser interface, using, for example, display (120)

In order to protect the privacy of the users, some or all of thedirectly-input user data (290) may remain resident in the user-operatedreceiver (110), according to the user's preferences.

The wireless device (180), if implemented as a cellular telephone, maycommunicate with the service provider by using its data modem function.

The wireless device (180), if implemented as a cellular telephone, maycommunicate with the service provider by using the data services of thecellular telephone network.

The wireless device, if implemented as a cellular telephone, cancommunicate with the service provider by using the text messagingservices of the cellular telephone network. For example Short MessageService (SMS) can be used.

The service provider may comprise multiple entities that are notco-located. For example, the service provider may comprise one or morenon-co-located broadcast entities and/or one or more non-co-locatedwireless entities.

The program viewing statistics may be aggregated at receiver (110),wireless device (180), or gateway manager (320), to minimizetransmission time and/or bandwidth and/or cost. For example, viewinginformation may be transmitted from receiver (110) to wireless device(180) as each program is viewed. Processing at wireless device (180) mayreduce the raw viewing information to a smaller amount of informationsuch as statistics only. As a simple example, if a program is viewedmore than once, it may not be necessary to transmit all of theinformation describing the program to the service provider; only theprogram title and a count of the number of viewings of that program maybe transmitted to the service provider.

A program guide may be transmitted from the service provider to wirelessdevice (180), and the program guide may be accessed by receiver (110)using a simplified user interface. This may minimize storage and/orprocessing power requirements at receiver (110). For example only asubset of the program guide information may need to be accessed atreceiver (110) at any given time.

A program guide transmitted to receiver (110) and/or wireless device(180) may be based on the location of the receiver or wireless device.Receiver (110) or wireless device (180) may transmit its location, forexample its GPS coordinates, to the service provider, and the serviceprovider may then transmit a program guide appropriate to the locationof receiver (110) or wireless device (180) to receiver (110) or wirelessdevice (180). Alternatively, information describing one or more programscurrently or recently received by receiver (110) may be transmitted tothe service provider and the service provider may then consult adatabase to determine other programs that may be receivable based on theprograms already received. An appropriate program guide containing thesepotentially-receivable programs may then be transmitted to receiver(110) and/or wireless device (180) by the service provider.

Wireless device (180) may run a web browser that may be accessed by asimplified user interface from receiver (110). Interactive videoprograms may use a web page for interaction, and running the web browseron wireless device (180) may save processing power at receiver (110).

Receiver (110) and wireless device (180), or the service provider mayprovide a swap function that enables the receiver user to interchangethe video displayed on receiver (110) and wireless device (180). Forexample, if the user notifies the service provider that she wants towatch two programs simultaneously, the service provider may transmit thefirst program to receiver (110) and the second program to wirelessdevice (180), if wireless device (180) also has a video display, e.g.,(189). It may be desirable to listen to the audio of only one of the twoprograms at a time. However, from time to time the user may want tolisten to the audio of the “other program”. Receiver (110), beingintended for audio-visual material, may have a display (120) and/orsound reproduction system (122) that is superior to that of wirelessdevice (122). The service provider, or receiver (110) and wirelessdevice (180) operating collaboratively, may offer the receiver user thecapability to swap the first and second programs back and forth betweenthe displays, for example (120) and (189) of receiver (110) and wirelessdevice (180), respectively.

Receiver (110) may notify the service provider of intermittent loss ofreception of a program. The service provider may provide that program towireless device (180), and/or to receiver (110), using short rangeconnection (190), during the periods of reception loss. Alternatively,the service provider may provide a summary of the program during periodsof reception loss. The summary may comprise video clips and/or audio,and/or text. A delay may be interposed in the broadcast video toaccommodate delay in generating the summary.

Wireless device (180) may provide an audio-visual programming storageand replay function for receiver (110). Programming data may betransmitted to and received from wireless device (180) using short rangewireless connection (190). Wireless device (180) may include a largehard drive or flash memory to store the program data. This may saveprocessing power, battery life, storage space and device cost ofreceiver (110).

The embodiments of the present invention may be implemented with anycombination of hardware and software. If implemented as acomputer-implemented apparatus, the present invention is implementedusing means for performing all of the steps and functions describedabove.

The embodiments of the present disclosure can be included in an articleof manufacture (e.g., one or more computer program products) having, forinstance, computer useable or computer readable media. The media hasembodied therein, for instance, computer readable program code means,including computer-executable instructions, for providing andfacilitating the mechanisms of the embodiments of the presentdisclosure. The article of manufacture can be included as part of acomputer system or sold separately.

While specific embodiments have been described in detail in theforegoing detailed description and illustrated in the accompanyingdrawings, it will be appreciated by those skilled in the art thatvarious modifications and alternatives to those details could bedeveloped in light of the overall teachings of the disclosure and thebroad inventive concepts thereof. It is understood, therefore, that thescope of the present invention is not limited to the particular examplesand implementations disclosed herein, but is intended to covermodifications within the spirit and scope thereof as defined by theappended claims and any and all equivalents thereof.

1. A method of providing interactive services to a mobile device,comprising: transmitting programming on-air to a first mobile device bya first facility in communication with a service provider; receiving bya second facility in communication with the service provider firstinformation based on the programming, wherein the first informationcomprises information relayed from the first device to the secondfacility after being processed by a second mobile device; transmittingby the second facility second information to the second device, whereinthe second information comprises information to be processed by thesecond device and relayed from the second device to the first device;and transmitting third information comprising at least one update tosoftware of the first device by a facility selected from the groupcomprising the first facility and the second facility, wherein the atleast one update is based on a pre-update software complement andpre-update usage information of the first device.
 2. The method of claim1, wherein the receiving is initiated when communication cost isfavorable.
 3. The method of claim 1, wherein the receiving is responsiveto a request transmitted by a facility selected from the groupcomprising the first facility and the second facility.
 4. The method ofclaim 1, further comprising aggregating programming viewing statisticsby a processing node selected from the group comprising the firstdevice, the second device, the second facility, a gateway manager andthe service provider.
 5. The method of claim 1, wherein the firstinformation comprises programming usage information compiledautomatically by the first device.
 6. The method of claim 1, wherein thefirst information is selected from the group comprising interactiveresponse information, program usage information, the first device user'sviewing preferences, the first device user's device operationalpreferences, and the first device user's demographic information.
 7. Themethod of claim 6, wherein the usage information comprises at least aportion of the usage information that was stored by the second device atan earlier time.
 8. The method of claim 6, wherein the usage informationis generated from information that documents viewing of the programming.9. The method of claim 1, further comprising receiving from the seconddevice the usage information and software complement information priorto transmitting the update.